In The Fire Lane: Fire Coversall Fire Coveralls

Title: In The Fire Lane: Fire Coversall Fire Coveralls
Time/Place:  September 22, 2023 in Nebraska City, Nebraska USA

This work was made during my August-September, 2023 Artist-In-Residence at The Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts in Nebraska City, Nebraska USA

Size: varies
Materials: zip hazmat suit, image transfers, urban fire zone

 

Details:
Fire Coveralls is a hazmat suit covered in flames, wearable, by me, by many. I use this wearable fire suit as a garment that I can climb into, as a way to try to enter, to attempt to more fully engage in a conversation I am unable to understand. Temperatures rise and extended fire seasons intensify. I made Fire Coveralls as fire seems to cover all, and I don’t know what to do about it. This work gives me the opportunity to grapple with how to exist in our climate crisis and live in our house on fire.

While wearing Fire Coveralls I insert my crouching body in a fire zone. I hunch, huddle as I see at the moment no other way to deal with impending doom, inevitable collective harm. I huddle, vulnerable, in ready, but immobile.

There is something fragile and fleeting in making my deep pain visible to the public. I use the demarcated pavement of this fire zone to create a space in which to speak of impending doom, a protective place to allow my hopelessness and fear to emerge, to become tangible in my body for a brief moment. There is tenderness in this work for me, but it might also read as a tad humorous, ridiculous, playful in an unexplainable way. This nods towards a dysfunction which also seems appropriate as we humans continue our climate collapse pathway.

Fire zones are buffers to allow emergency vehicles to park in case of fire, a safety mechanism, an area kept clear in an effort to protect. I want a safety mechanism implemented now as climate weather disasters increase. I long for a functional system of equity to emerge and protect when needed.